In the past, Kehlani always wanted to be a rock star, he told his audience in Amsterdam on Tuesday evening. But Kehlani became a pop singer, first as a teenager in PopLyfe, and later solo as one of the influential pop stars who so infectiously brings together ingredients of the popular R&B from the golden 90s with old and new influences from many other genres; from trap to afrobeats, and from country to 80’s rock.
With his most recent, fourth album Crash “the ideal middle ground has been found,” says Kehlani in Amsterdam. The mix of sultry and vibrant R&B with light-hearted pop, hip-hop, dancehall, country and rock has a chance to win three Grammy Awards in early February, such as the one for the best R&B song of the year and, as they call it at the Grammy Awards, the best ‘progressive’ R&B album of the year.
In Kehlani’s support act we first see another promising figurehead of modern R&B, the British kwn (pronounced: ‘ké-wan’). A versatile young songwriter and music producer who has already released some brilliant and incandescent bedroom jams, including the masterpiece that crawls further under your skin with every sweaty heartbeat ‘worst behavior‘, the most exciting R&B song in years. Also live, Kwn’s voice, processed with electronic effects, is smooth and silky and the beats are dragging and layered. But such a promising artist deserves more than a lonely tape act in front of the headliner’s main curtain; there is some wind blowing in the enormous concert hall.
Erotic duet
Kehlani’s music draws from the same source as that of kwn – as they also show and hear live in their erotic duet ‘Clothes Off’, in which they promise not to stop in a wet and sweaty bed until the neighbors come knocking. Kehlani makes great, haunting, electronic, sexy and sensual R&B that yearns and seduces. There is plenty of room for that side live, when melodies, synthesizer sounds, electronic effects and harmony vocals are more prominent.
Live in AFAS Live on Tuesday evening, however, the drum fills, squeaky echoing guitars and wildly waving hair of the rock star that Kehlani also wants to be are more dominant. “This is not an R&B show,” he even says coolly, minutes before a solid block of R&B can be heard, often supported by a vigorously singing along audience that holds telephone lights in the air, while Kehlani lies down on the show stairs among teeming dancers.
The attractive deeper layer in his music – the sensual heavy bass and pulsating electronic grooves – is sacrificed live to the wishes of the rock star that Kehlani wants to be, and who wants to stir up the audience with raggedly raw, screeching, distorted eighties guitar solos. and hard hitting snare drums. This sometimes results in a somewhat cold and turgid stage sound. Kehlani and band are stronger in the more quiet, melodic moments, where the powerful vocals and ingenious details in the groove of his music can also breathe fully live.